2012 is almost over and it’s been an absolutely crazy year here at Buffer. We launched a brand new iPhone app and web app and tons of new app integrations. Amidst developing all these new things, our team has also built in some nifty secret hacks and lesser known ways to use Buffer.

To make your sharing even more awesome and to give you an edge over everyone else, here are the top 10 hacks and hidden tricks to take your social sharing and using Buffer to the next level:

1.) Highlighting text on a page to directly share quotes

Has it ever happened to you that you are reading a great quote on the web, that your friends and followers should read too? That’s exactly what we wanted to do all the time. So we built this nifty feature to allow you to exactly do that.

Highlight any quote on a website:

Hit the Buffer button from your browser extension and share the quote together with the link:

2.) Directly share photos from websites to Facebook and Twitter – no more download, upload nightmare

With Pinterest, Instagram and also Facebook exploding with more visual postings, adding your own great pics to the newsstream is becoming a lot more powerful. And frankly posting images is a lot more fun too.

So, you know the painful, “save image”, “upload image” process we all have to go through every time when posting an image? Yes, you can now forget about it. All you have to do is right click any image and share it right away:

4.) Optimize the timing of your Buffered updates with this smart algorithm

Another super popular and also quite little known Buffer feature is that you can optimize your Buffered timings a lot further. This works via a cool collaboration we have with Tweriod, a cool Twitter analytics app.

They analyze your times, you click “connect with Buffer” and every update added will now go out at your new optimized times for more clicks, likes and reach. Get started here.

5.) The mobile Safari sharing bookmarklet – share any article on the go from your iPhone

Another lesser known feature is the mobile bookmarklet for Safari. It means that you can conveniently share any article from you iPhone similar to the Buffer browser extension.

Simply head the apps section after downloading the iPhone app and install the bookmarklet in just 2 easy steps:

We’re onto number 6 already. And this one can be a lifesaver for better sharing, especially if you are on mobile and can’t use our iPhone app or Android app. You can simply email your updates in:

Get your secret email address and try it out for yourself. We also have a bunch of extra goodies so you can specify what goes into which Buffer account. Here is the cheat sheet for shortcuts to add in the body:

7.) Copying updates to other accounts in the new web app

This is a feature we recently introduced with the launch of the brand new Buffer web app. You can now easily copy updates from your Twitter account to your Facebook account for example:

Oh and you can also copy past updates back into the Buffer:

8.) Turn the Buffer web app into an iPad app

Another awesome hack, is that you can easily turn the Buffer web app into your iPad app. Simply head to the Buffer website on your iPad. Hit the share icon and tap “Add to Home Screen”:

Then it’ll show up nicely in your app section:

9.) Pausing your Buffer over the holidays

Got your Buffer stocked up, but want to slow down a bit over the holidays? Here is how to pause it. Simply go to the Buffer web app, and under “Schedule”, click on all green days. If it’s all grey, you aren’t posting any updates any more:

10.) Buffer your retweets from Twitter.com or Tweetcaster

The last hidden Buffer trick, and probably one that I’m using the very most is to Buffer your retweets right from Twitter.com on the web or from a number of Twitter clients, including TweetCaster on mobile.

Simply install the Buffer browser extension and you are good to go getting more retweets out there:

Bonus: Shuffle your updates and move them to top

Oh and since it’s the holidays, we thought of giving you 2 bonus features too, that hopefully make your life a lot easier. With the new web app, you can now manage your Buffer a lot easier. One of these features is the “Shuffle mode”, which just mixes up everything that’s in your Buffer in random order:

And also, if you ever wanted to simply move an update to the very top, hover over what’s in your queue and put it as the top item with the click of a button:

With tons of different ways to use Buffer, I hope that there are a few tips and tricks in there, that might make your life easier and your social sharing a lot smarter.

Which one of these tips and tricks is your favorite? Are there any particular ones I might have missed that you love? I’d love your thoughts on this.

I really love the tips and hacks you have provided. The new update is great. I use it all of the time.

LeoWid

Hi Ryan, thanks so much for the kind words and that’s so great to hear, really glad you are liking these hidden tips!

jock_reynolds

Massive fan.. Love your work mate

http://www.qualitylogoproducts.com/blog Mandy Kilinskis

I learned hack #1 by accident – I kept highlighting the post title and then hitting the Buffer button. Regardless, it’s an excellent feature!

I love being able to hit alt + B to bring up the Buffer box! It’s super convenient if the blog doesn’t have social buttons and/or the Buffer button.

Definitely need to put the Buffer bookmarklet into my phone. Thanks for the cool hacks, guys!

LeoWid

Hi Mandy, awesome, so glad we could tell you about the highlighting one, it’s definitely one that’s very hidden, yet makes sharing so much more personal!

Ha yes, I think the Buffer bookmarklet for iPhone makes a big difference, let me know how you get on with that!

http://www.mrgeek.me/ Ali Gajani

Well done mate.

LeoWid

glad you like it Ali!

Regina Johnson

Buffer is a amazing quick way to share with your friends, family n networks!

LeoWid

Hi Regina, awesome, that’s so great to hear, really glad Buffer is useful!

http://www.facebook.com/gloriarand Gloria Rand

Love the highlighting text trick! My new fave feature. This alone will prompt me to use Buffer more in 2013!

LeoWid

yay!

http://joel.is/ Joel Gascoigne

That’s awesome Gloria I use it lots!

http://www.skipprichard.com/ Skip Prichard

Really great tips to use with this terrific tool. Buffer rocks.

http://twitter.com/thornybleeder Brian Thompson

Fantastic tips as always Leo. I have a quick question t hough, regarding making the web app on an iPad. In Safari, when i view the the Buffer site there’s a pop-up message at the top, which won’t disappear, that tells me to use the iPhone App. But the little “x” refuses to close the alert. Any hints on how to get rid of the alert?

http://twitter.com/thornybleeder Brian Thompson

seriously…? no one else has this problem? i can’t seem to get rid of the damn alert box. help.

Jeff Rutherford

Any hope whatsoever of Buffer adding Google+ sharing in 2013? I WANT THIS!

http://twitter.com/Cunningham_UK Alistair Cunningham

This’d be a G+ issue, not Buffer…

http://joel.is/ Joel Gascoigne

Hi Jeff, awesome to hear from you! We’re working hard to try and make it happen, but it’s not something we have complete control of. Google are taking care with how they release the API, so we have to wait until they open it up. Stay tuned though

Danielle Farrow

Oh yes – this would be great, so thanks for working on it!

http://iag.me/ Ian Anderson Gray

Wow- brilliant tips. I am so glad you have got a pause feature. I didn’t realise you had thi! I wanted to have a social media blackout on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day and I had to make sure I didn’t add any more posts to my Buffer so it wouldn’t post. The pause feature would have been easier!

Michael

The one tip i wanted to use isn’t available? boo! I’m on Safari and want the left-click buffer image feature…

http://danielpaul.me/ Daniel Paul

Thanks for the tips

http://windmillnetworking.com/ Neal Schaffer

When a startup is already publishing a blog post about how to hack their app for greater productivity, you know the future is bright 😉

http://www.healthmodelinnovation.com/ Kevin Riley

I love it!

http://twitter.com/cmelakigor Zbynek Kysela

Well played guys from Buffer, well played! Love this app
And great work on this super useful article, thanks for sharing Leo!

Derrick

Thanks for the article! When I right-click images in Safari (I have the Buffer extension installed) I don’t get any option to “Buffer” as shown in Step 2?

http://www.facebook.com/zbynek.kysela Zbynek Kysela

Well played guys from Buffer, well played! Love this app
And great work on this super useful article, thanks for sharing Leo!

Thanks for the tips and tricks. Just updated my iPhone app and can’t wait to start using that tool to buffer.

http://twitter.com/CameronDARE Cameron Dare

Great post, thanks guys!

http://twitter.com/auredagaz Aureliano d’Agazio

Good app and great tips. Thanks Leo!
My favourite feature would be integration to Goo.gl – hope one day we could have it.

Steven McPherson

fantastic info, I’m new to buffer and this cheat sheet will advance my use ten fold

http://twitter.com/netizenpros ★Robson Grant★

Buffer just keeps on getting better and better!! What about adding an affiliate referral program to really explode your membership database??

http://twitter.com/OpsCons OperationsConsultant

i love the “highlighting and buffer” option, been using it for a while, extremely useful. But I think my new favourite will be the shuffle, sounds brill!

http://acceso-directo.com/ Ceci Saia

Great post! I already use most of these tricks, but seeing them all together just makes it clear why Buffer is one of my new essential apps. Definitely going Awesome on the new year! Keep up the great work.

Douglas Lim

Love how Buffer keeps getting better and better. My fav feature would be the highlighting of a line of text – sometimes I like to share great quotes or comments. Keep up the great work!

http://christopherbattles.net/ Christopher Battles

I have not used for it awhile, just because I got out of habit with it, but will be picking it back up again. Thanks for the reminders and tips.

K, bye

http://twitter.com/jwongjk Jan Wong

It’s amazing how Buffer became so huge so quickly. Definitely still my most favourite app out there. My favourite is #2!

anniebiz

you are all brilliant! Thanks.

http://twitter.com/Erin_WSP Erin Leitner

I think i was more excited reading this than I was opening my Christmas presents.

scrignac

ça m’a soulé tampon ce soir je repasserais

http://twitter.com/TonyEsposito Tony Esposito

BUFFER! Add a mass buffering feature ala Hootsuite

http://twitter.com/TonyEsposito Tony Esposito

BUFFER! Make this compatible with LinkedIN Company Pages

http://twitter.com/TonyEsposito Tony Esposito

BUFFER! Last thing I promise…If you could also make it an option, while on the desktop to send a link to a friend via direct message / email that would be awesome

http://www.liewcf.com/ LiewCF

I think I am an experienced Buffer user. I know all tips except “Pausing your Buffer over the holidays” 😉

By the way, any idea how do we find out the “best time to publish facebook updates”?

http://ramyantar.com/ Himanshu Pandey

Buffer is amazing and day by day becoming better…and favorite to most people.

Thanks for the tips.

http://www.wewake.net/blog Wewake Saynoy

I absolutely love Buffer! And these are more reasons to!

http://www.facebook.com/selena.thurbon Selena Thurbon

After a rocky start with Buffer (I think me more than the product) – I am loving this app!!!! I had worked out most of the tips by accident, I found a few new ones to make my life easier and love that they are now all listed together. Thanks Folks – you rock!!!

http://www.PuraVidaMultiMedia.com/ CAELAN HUNTRESS

Love it. Great tips.

http://www.facebook.com/kaye.dennan Kaye Dennan

Have only been using Buffer for two days and LOVE IT already!!

http://joel.is/ Joel Gascoigne

Wow, that’s amazing to hear Kaye! Let me know if you have any questions at all.

http://ampleindsol.com/ Dilbag Koundal

This is going to be an Interesting and big app in upcoming future. Good luck Buffer Team

Kim Prince

My favorite is #1 – it’s a feature I’ve used since I started Buffering. A quote from a post is often much more enticing than its title. Thanks Buffer!

http://twitter.com/stewartmar stewartmar

Thanks for these hacks. Love the app already and these hacks make it even more useful

Kimberly Castleberry

Thrilled to see you finally got Tweriod integration!

http://joel.is/ Joel Gascoigne

Absolutely Kimberly, Tweriod is awesome and I’m super happy we have that integration available.

http://marketingwizdom.com/ Robert Clay

Awesome post and improvements guys. Thanks

http://joel.is/ Joel Gascoigne

Thanks Robert, and I really appreciate the continued support over the long-term!

Marianne Sandling

Thank you! This was really helpful, and I’ll be using some of the suggestions for my blog!
Marianne

SandlingAllDay.Blogspot.com

http://joel.is/ Joel Gascoigne

That’s great to hear Marianne! Have an amazing New Year ahead

http://www.copperreflections.com/ handmadejewelry

These are great thanks.

http://twitter.com/Really_Useful RUTD

great tips, i love Buffer. I will some of these tips in a post I am doing for students.

http://www.facebook.com/findlay.hilchie Findlay Turtle Hilchie

I love you guys

Michael Haley

Great! I picked up a couple tips that I will use. Thank you… I used one already to share this!

http://www.dougsmithlive.com/ Doug Smith

I just discovered Buffer this year! Love it! Thanks for sharing this advice!

http://twitter.com/henry_woodcock Henry Woodcock

Great tips for a great social media app – keep the goodness coming guys…

http://twitter.com/larsonlacey Lacey Larson

This is FANTASTIC! I’m so excited to take advantage of these hacks, particularly creating an iPad app for myself. Thanks, Buffer! 😀

http://twitter.com/ChattingSense Philippa Wynn

Hiya Joel,
Wow, well done, I reckon you pretty much nailed all the requests with this update! Love that I can share pictures so easily, and the sharing of highlighted text is a stroke of pure genius! Well done, Team Buffer!!

http://twitter.com/wagthedoguk Wag The Dog UK

Thanks for all the tips…2013 is going to be great for sharing!

http://physiquerescue.com/ Matthew Hampton

Love all the new features! The highlight trick and the email functionality are wonderful features that I use every day! Keep up the good work!

susan schwartz

Awesome just started using this app and love it thanks for these tips!

http://pegfitzpatrick.com/ Peg Fitzpatrick

Really amazing post, Leo. I love all the new features and you know I’ve been a Buffer fan for ages.

Thanks for continuing to improve the already fantastic!

http://twitter.com/AboveTheStatic Steve Birkett

Love it… the quote tip is simple but incredibly useful (stumbled across it a few months ago & never looked back). The Tweriod link up is new to me, though, and sounds like it has some potential. Thanks for all your hard work in making our lives easier with Buffer, Leo and crew… hope you’ve found some time to relax during the hols and here’s to a prosperous 2013 for you all!

http://www.facebook.com/RobertHacala Robert Hacala

My favourite feature is being able to copy past updates back into buffer, and to copy updates between accounts.

Thanks for this rockin’ product!

Rody Thauvin

Nice tips ! In my case, especially for the “buffer-by-email” and “buffer-image” features.
Thanks for this really cool toolset. We can see the effort you bring onto global integration and partnership with other products, and I am very satisfied in particular with your simple yet efficient UX and all recent improvements. This recent remake of your app really changes it for the better and in my view, made you go from “good app” to “great app”. Keep going like this. I really like your product !

I have a question though, for the “buffer-retweets” feature. You talk about a “number” of twitter clients. Is there a list somewhere ? Anything for Tweetdeck ? (i don’t think so, as i see no button, but would be nice to know alternatively what other clients can be used to take advantage of this feature)

Another question to the community (already asked by someone in the comments) : Do you guys know something similar to Tweeriod but for Facebook ? Thanks

http://www.BeEngaging.com/ Shana Bresnahan

Thanks for the tips! I’m still hoping for a simple pause button in the future I can’t ever remember which times go with which day for which account without a back-up list or screenshot.

http://www.lokatas.com/ Monsicha Hoonsuwan

I was about to complain that you guys don’t make iPad app, and then, BAM the answer is right there. Thanks Buffer ^_^ Now, can we get a Flipboard integration for the iPad, too?

http://twitter.com/isocialize_au Celina Johnson

Love this post! I didn’t know I could email to fill up my buffer. Thank you.

http://www.andersgerdmar.com/ Anders Gerdmar

Superb! Thanks!

david k waltz

Any buffers I make in iPhone or iPad do not automatically shrink – any chance the next version will include the button again?

http://exde601e.blogspot.com/ George M.

Great tips, especially about posting by email to multiple services. I plan to use that with ifttt, since it only supports one account at a time. Btw, I love the personalization in the email guide! 😉

Awesome stuff. I have been a user of your product from the very beginning. It just keeps getting better and better. I love the shuffle button.

androszr

I’ve just bought tweriod premium sub however the page description and plans are totally unclear for me. I bought a premium plan, was looking forward to get the analysis however the page was not stating anywhere if the plan is under work or what. It said everywhere that I should purchase another premium plan and in the same time it was saying that I already purchased one! Totally out of control. I regret the time spent analyzing this option and also surprise you endorse such products here.

http://8minutes2live.wordpress.com/ Gunther Herzog

I liked the heads-up on Tweriod integration, but thought of one concern… for someone with fewer legitimate followers and more bots, as they’re building their following, Tweriod can seriously skew the times to favor bots that aren’t ever really reading the tweets. Right?

http://www.facebook.com/DJ.NDre André Soares

Does Safari has the same buffer image feature as Chrome?

Daniel Benny Simanjuntak

Without Google+ support, Buffer is useless to me.﻿

— topspot-official.blogspot.com —

http://iag.me/ Ian Anderson Gray

Really? I would never say Buffer is useless even though G+ integration would be awesome. I honestly don’t know what I’d do without Buffer.

However, is there any news on G+ with Buffer?

It would be also great to have a calendar view to schedule posts in the future.

I have been a faithful Buffer user for sometime now. Love it. My favourite feature that is new to me is the ‘Buffer this Image’ function;)

http://twitter.com/mr_bruchez Tim Bruchez

Hey. Can I post to my blog (blogspot) using Buffer?

http://twitter.com/BranchingOutEU Branching Out Europe

Don’t think anyone has mentioned this, apologies if they have.

One important trick that has been missed here is If you use the Bitly integration you get isolated post analytics that are speciic to your activity and not the aggregated post analytics that show universal activity that you get with the standard buffer shortener.

This is very important as you can see how your posts are doing independently, whereas the Buffer shortener shows every visit accumulated, even by others.

– Hope that makes sense!

http://twitter.com/geekabel Abel Cardoso

Great tips! I like number 2, I didn’t know it. From now on I will use it lot.

Guest

Looks like a great app! Going to check it out, thanks!

http://twitter.com/MarkAaronC Mark Aaron Carlisle

you guys are awesome, Buffer has been my Twitter tool of choice for a long time now, I honestly don’t know how I would manage to tweet regularly without having to juggle the ‘real’ life responsibilities of relationship and work! It’s amazing that you also follow back those you actually use and love the app, too often social apps miss the point of their target audience by not being actively social. You hit the mark 😉 every time .. kudos and please, keep getting better

http://www.empoweringthe80percent.com/ Ellory Wells

Great tips! Thank you for sharing these. Buffer is my go to app for sharing

http://www.beckycastlemiller.com/ Becky Castle Miller

Buffer image…awesome. Thanks.

http://www.chiaracokieng.com/ Chiara Cokieng

Haven’t tried it yet, but I’m guessing Tweroid might be my favorite.

Also I love the highlighting text and right clicking on pictures to put them on Buffer.

Awesome stuff.

http://www.facebook.com/momchil.nikolov1 Momchil Nikolov

I can’t see any feature list whatsoever on your site. Just an “awesome” page for upgrade? But why should I upgrade, what would I get. I can’t even find a basic feature list. I landed on this page when searching for “feature list bufferapp” on google. Do you need a lesson on value proposition?

http://iag.me/ Ian Anderson Gray

Just visit the Awesome page (link in the footer of each page on the Buffer website).
In the Awesome plan you get unlimited posts in your Buffer (you only get 10 in the free plan). Also on the Awesome plan you get to add up to 12 social networks where as the free one only allows you 1 Facebook, 1 LinkedIn, 1 appdotnet and 1 Twitter. You also get team functionality (2 team members) with Awesome which can help if there are a number of you who are managing social networks. Hope that helps.

http://kylemjones.com/ Kyle Jones

This was a FANTASTIC tutorial. Thanks!

http://www.theholistichomeschooler.com/ Michelle Cannon

I love buffer! The only thing I think could be improved upon is the image statistics. Although using buffer links, it doesn’t show me clicks if I post with an image attached. Is there a trick to this?

Athena DeVonne

When can we upload more then just one photo to a post?

Tiberiu Augustin Georgescu

Safari Extension doesn’t have “Buffer This Image” option in the right click menu.. It works fine in Chrome, but not in Safari.. Am I doing something wrong?

Dani

Ditto. Any word on this being added?

dezaxatul

Yea, they said they are aware of this. No ETA tho’

http://www.daxserver.com/ Srihari Thalla

Simply awesome! I wish I had known these hacks long ago, specifically the image hack Gotta install the addon for Firefox after my shift to Ubuntu!

Nathan Pollock

Hi Leo, do these features only work on the ‘awesome’ version of buffer? I have the free version and can’t get seem to get the direct photo sharing to work as you described.

Belle

Sorry about this, Nathan, You should have photo sharing in your free Buffer account. If it’s still giving you troubles, would you mind sending us an email to hello@bufferapp.com? We can take a look at what’s going on in your account and hopefully sort it out for you.